Archive for August, 2007

Video Surfaces of Cheney, in 1994, Warning That An Invasion of Iraq Would Lead to ‘Quagmire’By E&P Staff

Published: August 13, 2007 10:20 AM ET Sunday, updated Monday
NEW YORK It’s not the first time that citizen “investigative journalists” have uncovered some embarrassing, or telling, nugget from the past that apparently remained buried for years. But it has happened again with the posting of a now wildly popular video on YouTube that shows Dick Cheney explaining in 1994 that trying to take over Iraq would be a bad idea and lead to a “quagmire.”

The people who put it up come from a site called Grand Theft Country, the on-screen label cites the conservative American Enterprise Institute, and the date on the screen is April 15, 1994. That looks right, by the age of Cheney.

It first appeared on C-SPAN and was re-aired last week on C-SPAN 3, according to a C-SPAN spokesman.

Posted on YouTube on Friday, it had received over 100,000 hits by this morning, after being widely-linked around the Web. The transcript of this segment is below.

Cheney had helped direct the Gulf War for President George H.W. Bush. That effort was later criticized for not taking Baghdad and officials like Cheney had to explain why not, for years. Some have charged that this led to an overpowering desire to finish the job after Cheney became vice president in 2001.

“In the last years of his life, a contemplative Roman senator embarks on one last epic endeavor: to retell the history of human creation and reveal the little-known story of the Clefts, an ancient community of women living in an Edenic coastal wilderness. The Clefts have neither need nor knowledge of men; childbirth is controlled through the cycles of the moon, and they bear only female children. But with the unheralded birth of a strange new child?a boy?the harmony of their community is suddenly thrown into jeopardy.”

“In this fascinating and beguiling novel, Lessing confronts the themes that inspired much of her early writing: how men and women manage to live side by side in the world and how the troublesome particulars of gender affect every aspect of our existence.”

Heard about it on NPR last night. Sounds like fun.

Hint: The fems (The Clefts) are in charge and refer to man-childs as “deformed monsters” because their goodies are on the outside. Gotta love it!

Hog called us Friday evening with the news that his surgery was a success; his doc was happy with the result, and he was home and getting around well. He said it was a much easier recovery this time compared to last Fall.

Job-wise, he’s hanging in there. His union is grieving the firing, and he has some hope for a good resolution with that.